Pan-cancer analysis of super enhancer-induced PRR7-AS1 as a potential prognostic and immunological biomarker

Front Genet. 2023 Apr 6:14:1160599. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2023.1160599. eCollection 2023.

Abstract

Introduction: Systematic pan-cancer analysis of the roles and regulatory mechanisms for PRR7-AS1 is currently not available. Methods: In the present study, a comprehensive bioinformatic approach was used to mine the underlying oncogenic effects of PRR7-AS1, including expression status, prognostic value and immune characteristics. Results: We discovered that PRR7-AS1 expression was remarkably upregulated in most cancer types and exhibited a negative correlation with the prognosis. Furthermore, PRR7-AS1 expression was inversely connected with the majority of tumor-infiltrating immune cells, immune scores and immune checkpoint gene expression in pancancer. There was also a significant correlation between PRR7-AS1 expression status and tumor mutational burden, microsatellite instability, and neoantigens in certain tumors. PRR7-AS1 had the best predictive power for immune checkpoint blockade efficacy compared to other well-recognized biomarkers. PRR7-AS1 overexpression could affect cytotoxic T cells-mediated antitumor responses. Functional enrichment analysis revealed that PRR7-AS1 might be involved in the metabolic pathways. Super enhancer activity might have participated in the regulation of PRR7-AS1 expression. And we constructed the competitive endogenous RNA networks for PRR7-AS1. Discussion: In general, PRR7-AS1 had the potential to be a diagnostic, prognostic and immune biomarker for pan cancer. PRR7-AS1 was correlated with an immunosuppressive microenvironment and was a new potential target for immunotherapy. Epigenetic factors were the driving forces for PRR7-AS1 overexpression in tumors.

Keywords: PRR7-AS1; bioinformatics; biomarker; pan-cancer; super enhancer; tumor immunity.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81902404), the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province (ZR2019BH009 and ZR2020QH096) and the Project of Shandong Province medical science technology development plan (2017WS403 and 2019WS601).